Illuminating the glass ceiling: The role of organizational culture preferences

Abstract

We present two studies that investigated women's motives to pursue a career in top management. The central hypothesis was that masculine culture preferences are important predictors for career motives. Women were expected to have less masculine preferences than men do, which is assumed to be a determinant of their relative absence in management positions. In Study 1 ( N =327), we investigated gender differences in organizational culture preferences, both in a managerial sample and a sample of non‐managerial professionals in private sector organizations. It was shown that gender differences only existed in the non‐managerial groups, with women showing less masculine culture preferences than men did. In Study 2 ( N =350), we examined the effects of organizational culture preferences on the ambitions of staff employees and middle‐level managers to pursue a career at a top management level in one governmental organization. The results showed that organizational culture preferences were predictive for ambition of non‐managerial employees, but not for that of middle management employees. Overall, women were less ambitious than men, and even ambitious women perceived work‐home conflict as an important barrier to career advancement.